1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to processes for treating meat and more particularly to a process for treating a quantity of meat pieces to raise myosin protein to the surface of the pieces of meat and to increase the absorption of fluids or additives.
2. Description of the Prior Art
It has been known for several years that if the myosin protein found in meat can be brought to the surface of the meat, the adhesive qualities of the myosin will bind individual meat pieces during cooking into a solid whole piece of meat. This improves the appearance of the meat for presentation to the market. There have been many machines designed to release the myosin, most of which abrade or cut the surface of the meat, and these machines extract the myosin in a relatively short period of time. However, they are very crude and have a destructive effect on the meat and its resulting appearance. They also reduce the meat's capability to absorb injected pickle or retain its juices. These prior art machines are also often dangerous to operate and require considerable hand labor in processing the individual meat pieces through the machines.
Another type of machine for raising myosin to the surface of the meat employs a method which permits large batches of meat pieces to be worked concurrently without individual hand processing, but the process is much slower. This method involves placing large quantities of meat pieces in large rotatable drums, called tumblers, which have internal paddles or baffles which beat, pound, mix, and tear the meat as the drum rotates to cause the myosin to be released. While this latter tumbling process is effective, and can be used for large quantities of meat without hand processing, it is a very slow process and may take from six to eighteen hours with the machinery of the prior art to effect the proper myosin release. It is also known that tumbling the meat in a vacuum increases the rate of myosin release. The problem with this tumbling method is that high volume production requires a large number of expensive machines to do the work because of the slow processing time.
Using a standard size tumbler, as employed by the prior art, applicant's process reduces the time for releasing the myosin to less than one hour which results in a tremendous increase in production volume per machine. An additional and equally important advantage is that the process of the present invention can be used for delicate meats. A further advantage is that greater fluid absorption of additives such as brine, pickle, and NRBB, is also achieved.
The present prior art tumblers and other meat processing machines for raising myosin cannot be used for the delicate meat products since they destroy the appearance and integrity and absorption capability of the meat pieces. They therefore cannot be advantageously used for processing bone-in ham, boneless smoked hams, other water added meats, port loins, bacon bellies, and picnic and poultry pieces due to their destructive effects on the surface of the meats.
The present invention tumbles the meat pieces in such a different manner that it does not tear the meat apart. It maintains the meat pieces intact whereby the process can be used for meat products that previously could not be quickly processed or could not be processed at all by the prior art machinery.